The Fog of Dreams

by Justin Bell

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  It was no longer bright outside, in fact, the world around the Strickland house had settled into a dark gray dusk, the sun making its trek across the sky and down over the horizon like a lazy fisherman coasting across the surface of a blue lake.

  William Strickland sat on his couch, fingers clenching and unclenching, eyes focused on the television in front of him, but not fully absorbing the flickering pictures that danced on its screen. For the majority of the day he'd waited for someone to knock on his door and ask him about the events outside, but that someone had never arrived. At around lunch time, he'd stopped going back to the window to look out and had retreated to his basement, focusing his attention on the files and computer in his office basement. Each day he peeled apart another layer of the complex onion of his life, and each day the fresh stench stung his eyes, but left no new revelations. It appeared as if there was just enough information to keep him looking, but not enough information to clearly tell him what was happening, and it was a frustratingly helpless combination of events.

  Where normally he might find some respite in an outside jog or trip into town, today he felt penned in by the hovering crew outside. Although they had not approached his house, he still felt as if he dared not approach them, or risk uncloaking his very existence and welcoming the scrutiny he tried so hard to avoid nearly his entire life. Instead he'd retreated inwards, drawing himself into the world of cyberspace, combing through any trace of social media or Internet history of his close knit family. Turns out his close knit family was even more close knit than he remembered, and his wife didn't even have a Facebook page, much less any kind of other public Internet presence to speak of. I suppose that's to be expected when you're the wife of a lifelong Special Forces operator and glorified intelligence spook.

  Night settled around the Strickland home. His front yard and the road outside his house had been cleared a couple of hours ago, without even a section of police tape marking the spot where apparently two people had died.

  How had he known that?

  He'd heard it.

  Throughout the day, he'd had spikes of sensory overload, a sudden influx of sounds and smells that were strong enough to force him away from the windows, but during very specific moments of time he had been able to hone those senses into a focused knife's edge, and actually pick out some words and meanings. Two people had died out in front of his house last night. Two people had apparently been mauled to death by some wild animal, though precisely what kind of animal was still up for anxious debate.

  But a wild animal attack didn't quite explain all of the police presence, or that government looking guy in the neatly pressed suit who had confronted the female police officer. Truly there was something more going on here, but Strickland wasn't sure he really wanted to know what it was. Enough strangeness had crossed his path over the past several days, he didn't need to pile wild animal attacks on to the top of the already unstable stack.

  Besides, he'd kept odd hours the past few nights, and he thought tonight he should try and go to bed early for a change, maybe wake up fresh minded and ready to focus on something useful.